New Credit Card Charges Coming in Spring

Today we received notice from our merchant services provider about various new charges being introduced, many on different dates in April, and one in August. Most involved MasterCard.

There are going to be premium charges for flash sales (what we call ‘tap’ sales) as well as handful of charges for “card not present” transactions, including the processing of the security numbers on the back of the cards.

The provider is suggesting you can call to get the acceptance of tap sales disabled on your point of sale processor. (But didn’t you pay a little more on your monthly rental of the machine itself to have that capacity?)

But here’s where it gets really disturbing: There are going to be charges for failed transactions as well as successful ones involving those security numbers. You do the processing, the transaction is declined, but you’re still charged.

There are also charges for credit verification. In other words, certain types of inquiries — I think this is going to hit restaurants and motels especially hard — where you are verifying the card but not completing a finalized transaction.

Heard enough? There’s more. Many of the new charges are going to be in U.S. dollars. Why? Because they can.

Ever wonder how all those MasterCard providers can issue all those customer reward points and give away all that stuff? It’s more easily understood when you realize how much the merchants are covering all this, and will be covering it even more in the years to come.

That 40-inch television your customer has in the living room? You paid for part of it.

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